Walleye thriving and so is Freeland weekend tournament

Published 8:00 pm, Wednesday, April 22, 2009

People once scoffed at the notion that Saginaw Bay and its tributary rivers could become a noted, restored walleye fishery.

It had been too long since the tasty coolwater fish thrived there, they said. The habitat had changed, the water had been fouled, newcomers introduced.

But Department of Natural Resources fisheries biologists, and local sport fishing groups ignored the naysayers, and they're having the last laugh now, as the region gets ready for the reopening of the inland-waters fishing season and the 24th annual celebration of the fishery that accompanies it.

The annual Freeland Walleye Festival kicks off Friday, with its fishing contest to begin at 12:01 a.m. Saturday morning.

Once focused just on the yearly return of walleyes to the river to reproduce, the contest now encompasses all Michigan waters, and winners could come from anywhere.

But the fact is, there's nowhere in Michigan with walleyes as good as the Saginaw Bay watershed.

"Fishing should be good," said Don Leuenberger of Saginaw, who won the Saginaw Shiver on the River contest last winter with a 13-pound, 4.25-ounce monster, has won the Freeland Festival several times, and has often been a contender for top honors.

"They're caching quite a few on the Bay now," he said of the Lake Huron waters where fishing remains open year-around, "and with cold nights, there should still be fish in the rivers," where fishing opens Saturday.

Where will Leuenberger fish? He won't. For the first time, he'll miss fishing the Freeland event, while he recovers from hip replacement surgery. But he'll be keeping track of the results, and be fishing again come May.

Anglers this weekend, meanwhile, will pony up $10 each by midnight Friday, and try for the heaviest two-day, 10-fish catch, and the $1,000 first-place prize it brings. The largest single walleye also wins an electric trolling motor and taxidermy mounting. Other prizes will be awarded by drawing to top-15 finishers and to others who registered fish.

Weigh-in is from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m, Saturday, and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday, at the Tittabawassee Township Park at Freeland. Spectators are welcome.

Fishing remains at the core of the festival, but it's surrounded by a galaxy of other events - city-wide rummage sales, Texas Hold 'Em poker tournament, kids fishing pond, foods and beverages, parade, live music and fireworks.

And it all goes back to the fish with the strange looking eyes, the white spot on its tail, and the tasty flanks - a species historically plentiful on the Bay but gone by the 1960s and 1970s.

That's when the DNR and sport fishing groups around the Bay began tending drainable ponds in which millions of walleye fry were reared to lengths of about two inches before plant-out.

"No question about it," said DNR Saginaw Bay biologist Jim Baker of the key role of the rearing pond. "That's what made it possible."

"We continued to stock walleyes when we were not getting natural reproduction," Baker said in a phone interview this week, "and built up a stock that was ready to take off. And the alewife collapse is what allowed that to happen."

Alewives, alien but long-entrenched residents of Lake Huron, eagerly feed on young walleyes, Baker said. When changing water and weather conditions pummeled alewives, walleyes rebounded so robustly that plantings of fish were no longer needed.

Today's walleye population, Baker said, "couldn't be better. We had another big year class (of newly hatched fish) in 2008. That makes 2004, 2005, 2007 and 2006 all monster hatches, and 2006 was no washout by any means."

Is that too many fish at the dinner table? "There seems to be enough food," said Baker. "The forage base seems to be holding up well."

Walleyes are flexible - they'll dine on what's most available from a list that includes several minnow species, smelt when they can find them, gobies, young-of-year yellow perch, gizzard shade and more.

Will alewives rebound? "We have no idea whether they will or not," said Baker. "but there was no sign of that happening in fall 2008 when the U.S. Geological Survey studied the Bay."

And so, what are the prospects for this weekend's anglers?

"If you dig out our prediction from last year, it will look just about the same," said Baker Monday. "It all depends on how much rain falls this week. But barring a gulley-washer, it should be a good opener."

"The fish spawned just about on time," he said. "A lot of fish have dropped back (into the Bay) post-spawn," said Baker, "but there are plenty left in the river. And unless the water gets so high it's up in the parking lots, anglers should do well."

Fishing on the Bay, meanwhile, is "perking right along. I always say Saginaw Bay is protective of its fish. We've had a lot of nasty, windy, cold weather. But when the weather is nice, I think anglers are doing quite well."

At one point during recent nice weather last week, Baker said he counted 29 boats on the Bay from one vantage point within the Recreation Area.

Leuenberger said he expects river anglers will do best jigging lead-headed jigs baited with minnows or plastic grub tails, or trolling with crankbaits such as Hot 'n ' Tots or Shad Raps - although he said with a laugh that given all the lure-stealing snags on the river bottoms, "That's a pretty expensive way to fish."

On Saginaw Bay itself, trolling with crankbaits or with night crawlers will probably pay off, he said.

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In the two settings this weekend, and at Tittabawassee Township Park at Freeland, anglers will celebrate a walleye bounty that would have been unthinkable a few decades ago.